The international jury of the 49th annual World Press Photo contest selected a color image of the Canadian photographer Finbarr O’Reilly of Reuters as World Press Photo of the Year 2005.

The picture shows the emaciated fingers of a one-year-old child pressed against the lips of his mother at an emergency feeding clinic in Niger. A devastating swarm of locusts and the worst drought in decades left millions of people short of food in the African state. The picture was taken in Tahoua, northwestern Niger, on 1 August 2005.

World Press Photo jury chairman James Colton described the winning image: “This picture has haunted me ever since I first saw it two weeks ago. It has stayed in my head, even after seeing all the thousands of others during the competition. This image has everything – beauty, horror and despair. It is simple, elegant and moving.”

This year 4,448 professional photographers from 122 countries entered 83,044 images in the most prestigious annual international competition in press photography. The judging sessions took place in Amsterdam from 28 January to 9 February and were completely digital. The jury gave prizes in 10 theme categories to 63 photographers of 25 nationalities from: Argentina, Australia, Bangladesh, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Greece, Hungary, India, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Lebanon, the Netherlands, Norway, People's Republic of China, Poland, Russia, South Africa, Spain, United Kingdom and the USA.